The Meaning of Their Saying: “We Have Not Seen Allah, but We Have Known Him by Intellect”
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
Question:
The questioner says: Honorable Shaykh, the sister Umm Abdullah says that a phrase circulates among the women, which is their saying, “We have not seen Allah, but we have known Him by intellect.” Is this correct?
Answer:
The meaning is correct. Allah, Glorified and Exalted is He, is not seen in this world; He is not seen with the eye in this world, nor by the sight of the eyes. Rather, the believers will see Him directly in the Hereafter as a favor to them. They will see Him in Paradise as a favor to them, because they believed in Him in this world without seeing Him, so He will satisfy their eyes by letting them see Him on the Day of Resurrection. As for the disbelievers, because they disbelieved in Him in this world and did not believe in Him, Allah will veil Him from their sight. Allah the Exalted said:[Al-Mutaffifin 83:15] In this world, Allah is not seen by physical sight, but He is seen by insight, the heart, and the intellect, by looking at Allah’s cosmic signs and looking at Allah’s Qur’anic signs and reflecting upon them, because the evidence points to Him, Glorified and Exalted is He. As the poet said: “How strange! How can the Divine be disobeyed? Or how can the denier deny Him? In every thing is a sign indicating that He is One.” Yes.
The presenter:
May Allah reward you with good.
The questioner says: Honorable Shaykh, the sister Umm Abdullah says that a phrase circulates among the women, which is their saying, “We have not seen Allah, but we have known Him by intellect.” Is this correct?
Answer:
The meaning is correct. Allah, Glorified and Exalted is He, is not seen in this world; He is not seen with the eye in this world, nor by the sight of the eyes. Rather, the believers will see Him directly in the Hereafter as a favor to them. They will see Him in Paradise as a favor to them, because they believed in Him in this world without seeing Him, so He will satisfy their eyes by letting them see Him on the Day of Resurrection. As for the disbelievers, because they disbelieved in Him in this world and did not believe in Him, Allah will veil Him from their sight. Allah the Exalted said:
No! Indeed, from their Lord, that Day, they will be partitioned.
كَلَّا إِنَّهُمْ عَن رَّبِّهِمْ يَوْمَئِذٍ لَّمَحْجُوبُونَThe presenter:
May Allah reward you with good.
Source
نور على الدرب - الفوزان - 02/221 — archive.org (7:37)
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.